Rolling Stone reporter, owner found liable in defamation suit over rape story

Reuters

The Rolling Stone story.

A University of Virginia administrator has won her $7.9 million federal defamation suit against Rolling Stone magazine over a retracted story about a gang rape at the school, according to court documents on Friday.

The 10-person jury found that the magazine, reporter Sabrina Erdely and owner Wenner Media liable in defaming the administrator, Nicole Eramo, the filings in U.S. District Court in Charlottesville, Virginia showed.

The magazine had reported in a November 2014 story, "A Rape on Campus," that a female student was raped at a university fraternity in 2012. Rolling Stone retracted the story after inconsistencies in the account arose, and police found no evidence of an attack.

Eramo, who was then an associate dean of students, accused the magazine of portraying her as unfeeling about the alleged assault and concerned only about hushing up reports of sexual assault.